Entries in auction
(6)

I've been getting pretty sick of reading auction results for some time. Mainly because each auction further cements the fact that I won't be getting any amazing classic cars for quite some time. Or maybe never, the way prices of even odd cars like the Jensen Interceptor have been going lately. But this latest Bonhams result really pissed me off in ways that surprise even me.The car in question is the "oldest unrestored mini in the world" and supposedly the 8th car off the assembly line. The car has sat since 1985, and is in "barn find" condition --an original and unmolested car, as they say. Other than a replaced drivers door, the car is just as it left the factory on July 31st, 1959-- other than the fact that it's a rusty, immobile piece of shit.The car may be "unmolested" but it was undeniably neglected, and terribly so. And the person who paid a mind-bending 65,000 USD (!) for one of the most common cars on the planet is buying into what has become a sickening fetish for neglect, driven by auction houses, that really has started to get under my skin. For a while, I enjoyed the idea of cars being found in original condition and nourished back to driveable condition without being overrestored, as with the famous barn find Bugatti T57 Atalante sold at Greenwich a few years back. That car is now roadworthy, but mostly unrestored, and kudos to its owner. But lately, between Peter Mullin's lake-bottom, lightly crushed Bugatti artifact and this utterly ruined Mini I feel like some car collectors have forgotten what the point of originality is. And whatever constituted the definition of "unmolested" as been tossed to the four winds. Unmolested, to any reasonable person, means that the car has been maintained regularly, kept in stock specification, and still has matching numbers. Original paint and interior are icing on that cake. But let me ask my fair-minded readers: Which is preferable? Rotten and torn original upholstery, or reupholstered seats replaced with original style material? Which is preferable: a quality respray from a 10 year old rolling restoration, or "original paint" intermingled with with rust all over the place because the previous owner was a hoarder who didnt give a fuck about his car for multiple decades while it sat and decomposed under a tarp? We give these hoarders far too much praise for "preserving history" when we should be asking them why the hell they couldn't bother to be better custodians of the historical artifacts they owned for so long. These high auction prices are just sanctioning this abuse and neglect, and frankly, I reject that idea. It was one thing when this "patina fetish" was confined to very rare cars like Bugattis and Delahayes that were usually neglected due to being hidden during the war, and due to the scarcity of parts in the following decades. It became more debatable when less rare classics like Gullwing 300SLs were on the block in this condition.

But no Mini owner has any excuse for not fixing their car and keeping it running. There was never a scarcity of OEM parts for these cars. They made millions of Minis! About 10,700 of them were made in 1959 alone! So enough with the barn finds. Enough with the auction house Kool-Aid! How about some garaged, frequently driven, lovingly maintained cars in a decent state? Shouldn't that be worth more than an immobile rust bucket, no matter what chassis number it has?

Our intrepid London-based contributor Davide de Giorgi filed the following report on his recent experience at the RM Auction:

RM Auctions in Battersea Park was the first Auction I managed to follow from the very beginning and I have to say has been a fantastic experience.

There were some truly amazing cars and the game of "trying to guess the price" kept me glued to the chair till the very last lot. The "feel" of the market seem to apply randomly and sure there were surprises. Most of the cars went for less of the estimate and quite a lot could not be sold. I wouldn't know how it could feel to offer £1,3000,000 for the 1955 Ferrari 750 Monza Spider and hear the reply "sorry, can't let it go for that price". Just another quarter of a million would have done to take home the only 750 Monza without the headrest finn, a car extremely familiar with the chequered flag.

Also unsold the 1966 Ferrari 275 GTB Alloy Berlinetta (£635,000), the stunning and unique 1972 Miura SV (£700,000) and one of my favourites of the day, the stunning 1965 Bizzarrini 5300 GT Strada.

Someone got away with a real deal on the 1958 Lister-Chevrolet "Knobbly". The estimate was reasonably between £460,000 and 590,000, for a car that has spent most of its life on the track and was offered completely restored but with a beautiful patina. Incredibly no one in the room moved a finger until an usual celebrity managed to take it home for £177,500. Sold.

The queen of patina, though, was the legendary Alfa Tipo 33/TT/3 that left Japan for the lower estimate, £525,000. I sure hope to see this monster at the next Le Mans Classic, this car is what motorsport dreams are made of.

Few cars passed the minimum estimate and you should have seen the expression on the face of the bidder when no one added anything to his £8,000 for a 1947 Chrysler Windsor Club Coupe'. The estimate was £25,000 to 32,000. Something like "what? really? where the hell am I going to put it now?"2011 proved the lucky year for the Voisin once again. After the glorification of the C-25 Aerodyne at Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance this summer, it's no surprises that RM's C25 Cimier coupe' went under the hammer for £340,000. The real surprise was the very pretty indeed 1927 Avions Voisin C11 Cabriolet. The estimate of £42,000 to £68,000 was completely wiped out by the final bid of a whopping £117,500. Staggering.

Unsurprisingly the queen of the night was the stunning 1958 Ferrari 250 GT LWB "Tour de France" Berlinetta. The room went silent and I was expecting a new world record when in fact the hammer fell on the 2 million mark. The lower estimate.

Lower than the estimate but still an achievement on its own was the delicate concept of the Ferrari Pinin. I spent good forty minutes around this car on viewing day because it has always been one of my favourite sedans of all time. It looks quite conventional at first sight but considering it was presented in 1980 it truly is one of the cars that inspired things to come. Being able to sit in it and enjoy the silence of that dashboard sitting at the wheel was truly an experience that will stay with me for a long time.

Was all this worth the £50 entry? Absolutely. In fact considering the fantastic 300 pages catalog, two days of fun and the party with food and drinks on tuesday night turn it into a pretty good deal.

It's times like this I wish I was a Russian oligarch. Or any sort of oligarch for that matter. In addition to the famous BMW 3.0 CSL that Frank Stella painted in graph paper livery for BMW's Le Mans assault in 1976, he also apparently painted an M1 on private commission in 1979. This makes the M1 in question the only BMW Art Car that will ever be available for private sale, since all the others reside in BMW's permanent collection. Even more curious is that this painted M1 was in the Guggenheim's collection since 1999, but it was never displayed, as far as I know, except to be driven in 2003 for an exhibition run. With an estimate of $450,00-$600,00 I'd say this car is a bargain by Art auction standards.

Today in London, Bonhams will be auctioning off a remarkable array of vintage (Pre-TAG) Heuer watches collected over many years by Arno Haslinger, who literally "wrote the book" when it comes to collecting these fine Swiss timepieces. Inextricably linked with motor racing, Heuers are, for me, the coolest vintage watches you could wish for. Enjoy this video of Mr. Haslinger talking about his 4 favorite watches from his extensive collection.